Three variables
by bhut
Summary: AKA 'Something New', for Andrew Garner wants a new life because life as Lash sucks. The Hive wants a new body. And Grant Ward is dead...really. He doesn't want anything, right?


**Something New**

 _Disclaimer: none of the characters are mine, but belong to Marvel._

 _Note: this story takes place in the same universe as my previous story,_ New Friend _, is._

Andrew Garner had had better times in his life, like any time before he had went through the terrigenesis and emerged a new man. Yes, he was even bigger and stronger than before, but he had a PhD in psychology, so physical advancement didn't really matter to him, and the fact that he could turn green and spiny at will didn't really help him buy the fact that whatever that had happened to him was an improvement. Sure, it gave him an in into his wife's work, but, again, he had never been much of a fan of S.H.I.E.L.D., (he worked with them only because of Melinda from the start), and to be honest, he had the feeling that May had shot him repeatedly and driven him into an ATCU stasis pod as part of their break-up...

And beyond that, Andrew Garner, now an InHuman runaway, had nothing going for him in his life - he had lost everything and acquired nothing that he could've, or would've, wanted. Maybe if he had confessed in S.H.I.E.L.D.'s director Coulson and his protege, Daisy Johnson, before he began to travel the world and killing people, things would've been different...but again, it wouldn't have been how he wanted to live his life - it would've been too closely entwined with S.H.I.E.L.D. than how he would've liked it: this way, at least, he had his freedom, with however few choices it came with. If he had cooperated with S.H.I.E.L.D. from the start, he would've had more choices, much more, but they would've been S.H.I.E.L.D.'s choices...he didn't want that from the start.

"Now what do I do?" he mused to himself as he sat in his latest hideout (it wasn't very good, but Andrew was working on it). "I cannot go back - to Melinda, to her agency, to Phil Coulson. I don't know where to go forth from here either. I cannot wait for Daisy and her InHuman friends to find me. I'm at the end of my rope. Now what?"

"Maybe WE can help?" spoke a voice that was familiar, yet also wasn't at the same time.

"We?" Andrew turned around and saw the face of the Hydra agent who had tortured him before. "Who are 'we'?"

"US! WE are Hive!" the agent spoke in a voice that clearly wasn't human or ordinary - yet somehow it didn't sound insane either; whatever the other man had it was more than just a mere split personality - much, much more. "WE can help you. Accept US!"

"Accept you?" Andrew skeptically asked.

"Yes! Into your body! WE will make you stronger! WE will make you wiser! WE will give you direction and guidance!"

"In exchange for what? My free will?"

"...Why not? It doesn't seem to serve you all this well so far."

"..." Andrew thought this over.

"Besides, your will will still be there. It just will working in cooperation with OURS! You still will be in charge, at least some of the time!"

"Really?" Andrew thought about this some more. "And do you promise not to hurt any of my - well, my and Melinda's - friends?"

"Just tell them to stay away from S.H.I.E.L.D. - or Hydra, for that matter - and they should be fine," the self-proclaimed Hive shrugged. "Is there a problem?"

"..." Andrew came to a realization that none of _his_ friends, nor hobbies, nor interests, nor anything, had much in common with S.H.I.E.L.D. ...or Hydra for that matter. Indeed, if it hadn't been for Melinda, Andrew wouldn't _be_ in S.H.I.E.L.D., even if they had offered him a position in the past, as they did with Hall, for example. "You know, this could work after all," he admitted, reluctantly, to the other InHuman. "Why do _you_ want a deal with _me_ , anyhow?"

"This body is wrong, very wrong," Hive confessed, reluctantly. "The memories have gaps, too many of them are hidden from US, too many of them are missing. The organs feel wrong, shifting and reshaping and pulsing, as if the old identity's will is still there, fighting US! This isn't what WE need - WE need you!"

"Do you?" Andrew asked, skeptically...

"Yes!" the answer was clear-cut and straightforward. "WE need you! You are better! You are stronger than he was!"

Andrew thought about this some more. "Well, WTF not?" he finally decided. "I have no intention of going back to S.H.I.E.L.D. and throwing myself at their mercy - I don't need it, nor am I interested in it. I don't like Hydra much either - I'm the wrong color for them, but with your help maybe I can do some reforms there or something. How does that sound?"

"WE like the way you think. Hydra is old news nowadays, it looks like - it could use some change. So do you and US have a deal?"

"Yeah, sure," Andrew reached out and grabbed other InHuman by the arm. "We have a deal."

Something scurried out of the other man's mouth, small and dark and round like peppercorn; it scurried down the body, (which turned limp and flaccid as soon as the thing was out of if), and up Andrew's - right into his open mouth.

Andrew released the other man, (who promptly fell down onto the floor of the hideout, like any corpse would), and began to jerk violently, turning and returning from himself to Lash and back - until he stopped.

"Well, this is interesting," Lash said thoughtfully, with a particularly nasty smirk on his lips. "I think it is time to launch a proper plan against Johnson and her lightning-blasting boyfriend and the others of S.H.I.E.L.D. who are helping them! The unworthy ones must be purged!" He whirled around and left, ignoring the corpse on the floor, which, after the big InHuman had left, got up and stood up and looked around - very coherently.

"Ok," Grant Ward told himself firmly. "This is _really_ not according to any plan. Not that I care...yeah, I do care. I got to call the bleeding chupacabra and her people and _then_ I'm picking up care. The astrolabe has worked!"

He took a deep breath and was gone as well.


End file.
